the rows of stockfish flapping in the wind, and the caldrons of stewing livers, faintly odorous from the steamer's deck. The Ökellesund (for so the northern passage between Stor Molla and Vaagöe appears to be called) is too narrow to admit the steamer, but turning north as we leave the Möldoren, we enter the celebrated Raftsund.

The Raftsund, which has won the hearty admiration of every traveller who has seen it, is a narrow channel, fifteen miles long, running north-east between Vaagöe and Hindoe. It is of various width, narrowest towards the north; on each side mountains of the most vigorous and eccentric forms rise in precipices and lose themselves in pinnacles and sharp edges that cut the clouds. As this is the one part of the Lofodens that has been somewhat minutely described, I need not linger in painting it. A few of the peaks, however, I can name. All the loftiest and boldest are on the Vaagöe side. Perhaps the strangest is Iistind, a gigantic mass with a tower-like cairn on the summit; Mahomet's Tomb we nicknamed it, till a native obligingly gave its true title. This is at the middle of the sund, where an island breaks the current, and several small fjords push into the land. Another very noble cluster of aiguilles is Ruttind, on Vaagöe, but much to the south of listind. These peaks are mostly wreathed with foamy cloud, that on a fine day daintily rises and lays bare their dark beauty, and as airily closes round them again. About the summits the rifts and joints are full of snow all the summer, and from every bed, leaping over rocks and sliding over the smooth slabs of granite, a narrow line of water, white as the parent snow, falls in a long cataract to the sea. On the Hindöe side, Kongstind, which lies north-east of listind, is the most striking mass.

On both sides near the water the ground is covered with deep grass, of a bright green color, and flowers bloom in beautiful abundance. In one place the harebells were so thick on the hillside that they gleamed, an azure patch, half a mile away. Flocks of sheep and goats luxuriate in this lush herbage; here and there ferns are in the ascendency, Polypodium phlegopteris and dryopteris being everywhere abundant.

Leaving the Raftsund, we suddenly enter that sea-lake which, as I said above,

holds the centre of the archipelago. We are now at the heart of the weird land, and the sight before us is one of the loveliest that can be conceived. The bristling character of the southern coast gives place to a calmer, more placid scenery. Here there are no subtle rocks, no frightful reefs; all is simple, serene, and stately. I cannot do better than give my remembrance of the first time I saw this scene, on a calm sunlit morning in July. Leaving the Raftsund, we bore due north. As we steamed through quiet shimmering water gently down on Ulvöe, at our back the ghostly mountains lay, a semi-cirque of purple shadow; down their sides the clear snowpatches, muffling the vast crevasses, shone, dead white, or stretched in glaciers almost to the water's edge. In sweet contrast to their grandeur, sunny Ulvöe rose before us, with the little kirk of Hassel nestling in a bright green valley; in its heart one violet peak arose, and hid its dim head in the mystery of the vaporous air above. The sea had all the silence and the restfulness of dreamland: not a ripple broke the sheeny floor, save where a flock of ducklings followed in a fluttering arc the mother-bird, or where the cormorant hurled himself on some quivering fish. Round the eastern promontory of the lovely isle we drifted; peak by peak the pleasant hills of Langöe gathered on our right, while to the left of us, and ever growing dimmer in the distance, the prodigious aiguilles of Vaagöe, in their clear majestic color, soared unapproachable above the lower foreground of Ulvöe. Behind us now was Hindöe, less grand perhaps than Vaagöe, but displaying two central mountains of immense height, Fisketind and Mosadlen, the latter reported to attain a greater elevation than any in the group.

Langöe lies very close on the right when we enter the Boröesund and make for Stokmarknæs. Boröe itself lies in the strait between Ulvöe and Langöe. The pretty hamlet on its shores was the centre of the investigations of Dr. George Berna and his friends, as related by Herr Carl Vogt in his interesting Nordfahrt. On the northern shore of Ulvöe, at the mouth of a small valley, lies the large village of Stokmarknæs. It is almost a town, containing perhaps 120 houses; it may be the most populous place in the Lofodens, though I am told that the discovery of coal in Andöe has greatly increased the village

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cut against an azure sun-lit sky. face of the sea was as smooth as glass, and over it rose the long line of snow-capped peaks, softening from rugged purple crags to emerald-green slopes as they approached the sea, looking about a mile off, though in fact the nearest of them was seven. I had determined beforehand which peak I should climb: it seemed to be the highest in Ost Vaagöe, and lay at the head of the Stover Fjord. My boatmen were pleasant fellows, and as I lay luxuriously in the stern, steering, I conversed with them in bad Norse; my questions had reference principally to the seabirds. A pretty little sort of guillemot with red legs they call testhe; this bird is very common another common bird, the heneider I think, is called ae. We passed many of these with a train of young ones after them. As the boat skimmed along we passed many beautiful jelly-fish one sort of bolina about the size of a gooseegg was particularly common. At last, after winding through many islets, we enter the Stover Fjord: the only thing I can compare it to is the Bay of Uri, which I think it surpasses in beauty, and the Aiguille de Dru is rivalled by these snowseamed pinnacles. But it was 12 o'clock, and I jumped ashore at a sort of elbow where the fjord forks. I put some provisions into my pocket; then, with my sketching materials slung upon my back and my alpen-stock in my hand, I commenced the ascent. I first scrambled over boulders covered with fern, bushes, and wild flowers; these soon became very steep, and slinging myself up hand over hand through the bushes was very warm work. I took off my coat and hung it in the strap on my back; after a sharp climb over steep rocks I got on to a slope of snow that filled the gorge. In about an hour and a half I reached a col that I had aimed at all through. I could see the boat, a speck below, so I jodeled at the top of my voice, and soon heard a faint answer. The place I had come up was very steep, and the thought of descending it again not very pleasant. I took the precaution, however, of fixing bits of white paper on the rocks and bushes where I had met with difficulty, to serve as guides in my descent. There was a glorious view from where I stood, and the day was perfection. After another hour of steep climbing I reached a cornice of snow, but

was able to turn off to the right and cross à level plateau of snow, from the other side of which rose up my peak. I now encountered very steep snow-slopes and rocks, and just before the snow rounded off into the dom, forming a summit, it became so hard that my feet could get no hold. I had to resort to step-cutting; about a dozen steps sufficed to land me on the dom; an easy incline then led to the summit, on which I stood at 4.30 P.M. I wished for an aneroid; but from the time I took to ascend, and from other circumstances, I should think the height to be over 4,000, and possibly 5,000 feet. Now for the view. I have yet to see the Alpine view that surpasses this in its extreme beauty: the mountain chain of the mainland was in sight for, I suppose, a hundred miles; then came the Vest Fjord, studded with islands. The mountains around me were of the wildest and most fantastic form, not drawn out in a long chain, but grouped together, and embosoming lovely little tarns and lakes. The inner arm of the Stover Fjord, over which I seemed to hang, was of a deep dark blue, except where it became shallow, where it was of a bright pea-green. This latter color may be accounted for by the fact that the rocks below low-water-mark are white, with pure white nullipore and balani; there is no laminaria or sea-weed of any sort in these narrow fjords, except Fucus vesiculosus, and this grows only between tide-marks. Looking away to the north came Ulvöe, with its fringe of islets; then Langöe, with its sea of peaks; these do not appear, however, to be so high or rugged as the peaks of Hindöe, that come next to the sight. Here Mosadlen stands up with his lovely crest of snow; far away, in an opposite direction, lies Vest Vaagöe, where I remarked another peak that seemed to be of a respectable height. view was perfection: one drop of bitterness was in my cup, and that was that a neighboring peak was evidently higher than the one I had climbed. It was connected with my peak by a very sharp rock arête, just below which was a flattish plateau of crevassed névé; it was too far to think of trying it, and it looked very difficult; an attempt upon it would be more likely to succeed if made from the south-east. Having made a sketch and built a cairn of stones, I looked about for the easiest way to descend, and found

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that a long slope of snow led into a valley connected with the north arm of the Fjord; this I determined to try. I climbed down the steps I had cut, with my face to the snow; then sitting down and steering with my alpen-stock, I made the finest glissade I ever enjoyed. As I neared the bottom it was necessary to go lightly, as a torrent was roaring along under the snow. soon had to take to the moraine, which was of a most trying character. I now got down to a charming little lake, in which islands of snow floated, and in which the peaks were mirrored to their summits. Skirting along this, and descending by the edge of a stream that led out of it, I came to another lovely tarn, on which were a couple of water-fowl. From this I clambered down through bushes at the side of a waterfall, and arrived on the strand of the fjord all safe. At 6.30 P.M. I was sitting in the boat, and in two hours arrived in Melbo."

The superior peak that dashed Mr. Green's happiness was Blaamanden, which must now be considered the highest point out of Hindöe. Vaagekallen is certainly lower even than Higraven.

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Of the northern islands of the Lofoden group space fails me to speak much; they are but little known. Langöe was skirted by the German expedition whose story is "erzählt von Carl Vogt," but his notes on this part of the tour are unfortunately very scanty. The northern peninsula would seem to be the finest part of Langöe. I hear of a splendid mountain, Klotind, which fills this tongue of land with its spurs. Andöe, the most northerly of the archipelago, is the tamest of all the interior of it has been surveyed with such minute care, that it is impossible to suppose its mountains can be very rugged. For the sake of any one desirous of visiting Andöe, I may remark that a little steamer has been started this year in connection with the large boat, which meets the latter at Harstadhavn in Hindöe, skirts the north of that island, calls at Dvergberg and Andenæs in Andöe, and after a visit to the north of Senjen, returns the same way to Harstad. The same steamer calls off the coast of Grytö, a mountainous Lofoden, whose vast central peak of Fussen one admires in the distance from the Vaags Fjord.

In ordinary years the snow disappears from the low ground in these islands be

fore May, and the rapid summer brings their scanty harvest soon to perfection. A few years ago, however, the snow lay on the cultivated lands till June, and a famine ensued. These poor people live a precarious life, exposed to the attacks of a singularly peevish climate. A whim of the cod-fish, a hurricane in the April sky, or a cold spring, is sufficient to plunge them into distress and poverty. Yet for all this they are an honest and well-to-do population; for, being thrifty and laborious, they guard with much foresight against the severities of nature. In winter the aurora scintillates over their solemn mountains, and illuminates the snow and wan gray sea; they sit at their cottagedoors and spin by the gleam of it; in summer the sun never sets, and they have the advantage of endless light to husband their hardly-won crops. Remote as they are, too, they can all read and write it is strange to find how much intelligent interest they take in the struggles of great peoples who never heard of Lofoden. It is a fact, too, not over-flattering to our boasted civilization, that the education of children in the hamlets of this remote cluster of islands in the Polar Sea is higher than that of towns within a small distance of our capital-city; ay, higher even, proportionally, than that of London itself.

I would fain linger over the delicious memories that the name of these wild islands brings with it; would fain take the reader to the pine-covered slopes of Sandtorv, the brilliant meadow of little Kjöen, so refreshing in this savage land; to the Tjeldæsund, as I saw it on a certain midnight, when the lustrous sun-light lay in irregular golden bars across the blue spectral mountains, and tinged the snow peaks daintily with rose-red. But space is wanting; and being forced to choose, I will wind up with a faint description of the last sight I had of the islands, on a calm sunny night in summer.

All day we had been winding among the tortuous tributaries of the Ofoten Fjord, and as evening drew on slipped down to Tranö, a station on the mainland side of the Vest Fjord, near the head of that gulf. It had been a cloudless day of excessive heat, and the comparative coolness of night was refreshing; the light, too, ceased to be garish, but flooded all the air with mellow lustre. From Tranö we saw the Lofodens rising all along the

northern sky, a gigantic wall of irregular jagged peaks, pale blue on an horizon of gold fire. The surface of the fjord was slightly broken into little tossing waves, that, murmuring faintly, were the only audible things that broke the sweet silence; the edge of the ripple shone with the color of burnished bronze, relieved by the cool neutral gray of the sea-hollows. From Tranö we slipped across the fjord almost due west to the mouth of the Raftsund. The sun lay like a great harvestmoon, shedding its cold yellow light down on us from over Hindöe, till, as we glided gradually more under the shadow of the islands, he disappeared behind the mountains at 11.30 P.M. we lost him thus, but a long while after a ravine in Hindöe of more than common depth again revealed him, and a portion of his disk shone for a minute like a luminous point or burning star on the side of a peak. About midnight we came abreast of Aarstenen, and before us rose the double peak of Lille Molla, of a black-blue color, very solemn and grand; Skraaven was behind, and both were swathed lightly in wreaths and fox-tails of rose-tinged mist. There was no lustre on the waters here; the entrance to the sound was unbroken by any wave or ripple, unillumined by any light of sunset or sunrise, but a sombre reflex of the unstained blue heaven above. As we glided, in the same strange utter noiselessness of the hour when evening and morning meet, up the Raftsund itself, inclosed

by the vast slopes of Hindöe and the keen aiguilles of Vaagöe, the glory and beauty of the scene rose to a pitch so high that the spirit was oppressed and overawed by it, and the eyes could scarcely fulfil their function. Ahead of the vessel the narrow vista of glassy water was a blaze of purple and golden color, arranged in a faultless harmony of tone that was like music or lyrical verse in its direct appeal to the emotions. At each side the fjord reflected each elbow, each ledge, each cataract, and even the flowers and herbs of the base, with a precision so absolute that it was hard to tell where mountain ended and sea began. The centre of the sund, where it spreads into several small arms, was the climax of loveliness; for here the harmonious vista was broadened and deepened, and here rose listind towering into the unclouded heavens, and showing by the rays of golden splendor that lit up its topmost snows that it could see the sun, whose magical fingers, working unseen of us, had woven for the world this tissue of variegated beauty. When I remember the Lofodens, I recall this moment, and think, O wonderful white sun, who dost bathe our bodies in healing waves of light, filling our eyes with the loveliness of the color of life and our ears with the subtle melodies of dumb things that grow and ripen in thy sight, how little men consider the greatness of thy work for us, and what a beautiful and mystical creation thou art thyself!

DR. PETERMANN, the eminent German geographer, has just announced a very interesting discovery. It will be in the knowledge of most of our readers that during the last two or three years, German, Swedish, and American explorers have been engaged in a series of attempts to reach the North Pole of the earth; or rather, it were perhaps more just to say that they have sought a less barren success, and that the ostensible purpose of their journeys has been to determine the true nature of those almost unknown regions which lie north of the 8oth parallel of latitude. Apart altogether from the interest attaching to the question whether the Pole of the earth can be reached, NEW SERIES.-VOL. XV., No. 1.

there is much to encourage Arctic research. The flora and fauna of Arctic regions are well worthy of study; and even more interesting are the glacial phenomena presented amid that dismal domain. The student of the earth's magnetism cannot but look with interest to those regions towards which the magnetic needle seems to direct him. Within the Arctic regions also lie the poles of cold; there the winds complete their circuit; and there, if a modern theory be correct, lies the mainspring of the whole system of oceanic circulation. But lastly, material interests are involved in Arctic voyaging; since the whale fishery forms no unimportant branch of industry, and its success depends in

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